


Corellian Ale

by jeeno2



Series: Rebelcaptain Stories [17]
Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Awkwardness, Drunkenness, F/M, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Unresolved Romantic Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-18
Updated: 2017-03-18
Packaged: 2018-10-07 09:44:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10357572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jeeno2/pseuds/jeeno2
Summary: Jyn accidentally drinks too much on an assignment, and Cassian helps her get home.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [katsumi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/katsumi/gifts).



> Written for the incomparable katsumi, to thank her for making a donation to charity. Her prompt was: “Jyn x Cassian, Jyn snuggling up to Cassian while she’s either sleeping or drunk, and Cassian freaks out about it.” ;) 
> 
> This came out to about 3000 words, and also ties in with @rebelcaptainprompts‘ prompts “temptation” and “one bed.” Hee ;)

“Oh,” Jyn says, when they get to her quarters.  “This… this is my room.”  

Cassian frowns at the surprise he hears in her voice.  He told her he was taking her home when he guided her out of the cantina half an hour ago.  

The brisk walk back to base must not have done much to sober her up after all.

“Uh, yeah,” he confirms. “We’re here.”

Cassian tells himself not to get any more flustered by this situation than he already is. Like that’s even possible. His arm has been wrapped protectively around her this whole time (just to help keep her upright during the walk home, of course), and Jyn’s been leaning against him for support for nearly an hour.  Every time she trips she stumbles right into him, and he can feel the press of her warm, soft body against his all the way down to his toes.

He hasn’t even gotten her inside her room yet and he’s already more flustered than he’s ever been in his life.

Cassian risks another glance at her, quickly taking in her glazed eyes and mussed hair. When she doesn’t say anything else he looks away again and swallows thickly, steeling himself for what comes next.  

“I, uh.  I need your keycard to open the door,” he says.

Jyn looks up at him with an addled expression.  “What?” she asks.  “Oh – my keycard. Right.”  She pats at her dress with clumsy hands for what feels like an eternity before finally finding the card and pulling it from a front pocket.  

She makes to hand it to him, then yanks her hand back at the last moment before he can take it.

Cassian makes an impatient noise.  Not this again.  “Jyn…”

“You di’nt need to drag me outta there, Cassian.  I was doing fine,” she reminds him stubbornly.  He can tell she’s trying hard to sound annoyed. But she’s slurring her words, and she doesn’t make any attempt to move away from his partial embrace. Both of these details undermine her efforts.

“Yes, I _did_ need to get you out of there,” he insists for the third time. He snatches the keycard from her.  Fortunately, she doesn’t try to grab it back. “You can hardly walk, Jyn.  And you were not doing fine. You fell flat on your face right in front of our contact.”

Jyn scowls at him.  “I tripped,” she says. “That’s all.”

He smirks. “Like I said,” Cassian says.  He swipes the card’s magnetic stripe along the groove in the keypad.  The door unlocks with a quiet _snick_. “You were not doing fine.”

He pushes the door open and motions for Jyn to follow him inside.

To his relief she complies without further protest.

* * *

 

Cassian has never been inside Jyn’s quarters before.  

Whenever they’ve stayed up late to go over a debriefing, or to map out their next mission on his datapad, they’ve always done it in his room.  

Cassian tries not to stare at the few personal effects Jyn has lying about as he guides her into the small single room, feeling like he’s crossed too many lines with her tonight as it is.

“I’m _fine_ , Cassian,” Jyn insists again. She slugs him on the arm for good measure. But she doesn’t use her full strength. It doesn’t hurt, and he doesn’t let her go.

He gently deposits her on the bed, doing his best to ignore the disappointment that rises up in him unbidden at the sudden loss of physical contact.

 _Now is not the time for this_ , he reminds himself.

“Okay, I give up. You’re fine.”  He raises both hands, palms towards her, in wordless surrender. This is not a fight he wants to have.  She’s back home now, and safe. That’s all that matters. “All right?”

She nods.  “All right,” she agrees, before slowly stretching out, catlike, on her bed.

* * *

 

Of all the potential disasters Cassian anticipated might happen at tonight’s meeting, Jyn ending up in her current state was not one of them.  

In retrospect, of course, he probably should have viewed it as a possibility.  

Jyn, for all her bluster and oversized personality, is tiny.  She probably weighs fifty pounds less than he does, and less than half what their hard-drinking Imperial contact at the cantina did.  What’s more, before tonight, Cassian had never once seen Jyn drink Corellian ale – or any other kind of alcohol, for that matter – even though Force knows there’s been ample opportunity for him to see such a thing these past few months spent fighting by her side.

On the other hand, why _should_ he have worried about her accidentally drinking too much ending up drunk?  Most of the time, Jyn seems more like a hurricane – a force of nature to be reckoned with – than a human girl with normal, human limitations.  Cassian has seen her pin Stormtroopers twice her size to the ground without breaking a sweat.  The idea that she might have trouble keeping up with them tonight at the cantina never once crossed his mind – until suddenly she was stumbling away from their table and he realized, all at once, that something had gone terribly wrong.  

“Cassian. C’mere,” Jyn mumbles from the bed, interrupting his thoughts.  She lifts her hand to her forehead and winces. “ _Ugh._  My head is killing me.”

A fresh wave of guilt washes over Cassian for getting her into this situation in the first place. He pinches the bridge of his nose and closes his eyes to calm himself before responding.  “I’m sure it is,” he says.  “I’ll… um.  I’ll go get you a glass of water.”  He jerks his thumb towards the refresher. “You just… stay there on the bed, all right? I’ll be right back.”

“No,” she says. Slowly, with difficulty, she sits up. She props herself up with one hand and pats the spot next to her on the bed with the other.  “Stay.”

He swallows, his throat going suddenly dry.  “Jyn,” he says, trying to keep his voice even.  “You’re going to feel terrible in the morning if you don’t let me –“

“ _Stay_ ,” she repeats.  More firmly this time.  “We need… we need to go over what we learned tonight from our… contact.”  She pauses.  “Before we forget everything.”

Her eyes slip closed, then, and she flops back down on the bed.  A moment later, she’s laughing.  It’s an unhinged, manic sort of laugh Cassian has only ever heard before from drunken flyboys enjoying some hard-earned leave.  

“Jyn,” he says warningly.  But his traitorous feet inch him closer to the bed all the same.  “I don’t think you’re in any shape to discuss tactics right now.”  Can she even _remember_ what they learned from Lieutenant Paravat?  “And I don’t think my staying is a good idea.”

“I thought we agreed I was fine,” she points out.  She laughs again.

Cassian sighs, and sits down heavily on her bed.  Tentatively – telling himself he shouldn’t do it, but somehow unable to stop himself – he reaches out and lightly rests his hand on her knee.  Her dress is ankle-length in the local Rivulian style, and made of very thick material, but he can still feel the heat of her body radiating up through the fabric and against his palm.

He thinks of how warm and perfect the _rest_ of her would feel, pressed up against him, and he has to dig his fingernails into his palm to keep himself in check.

Cassian clears his throat as he tries to clear his head.  “If we’re going to talk about the meeting, you should probably…. I don’t know.”  He swallows. “Sit up?”  He’s going to lose his mind soon if she doesn’t.

Jyn blinks at him.  Her cheeks are rosy and flushed in the dim light of her room, and her eyes are bright.  “What?  Oh.”  

She pauses a moment, as though considering his suggestion.  And then without another word, she rolls over onto her side – and directly into his.  

She lets out a long, sleepy sigh, and closes her eyes.

“Jyn,” Cassian chokes out, eyes wide with surprise.  

Jyn smacks her lips a few times but doesn’t respond.  She just snuggles closer to him, until her arms are bracketing his hips and her face is pressed up against the outside curve of his thigh.  

“Mmm,” she mumbles.

“ _Jyn_ ,” he says again, trying to ignore how very _warm_ her breath is against his leg, and how desperately he wants to know what it might feel like against his lips instead. He looks down at her, and notes with mounting panic that her facial features are beginning to soften, relax, just as they do whenever she dozes off for a moment in the co-pilot seat.

He puts a hand on her shoulder and gives her a gentle shake.  But she still doesn’t respond.  She burrows closer into him before giving another contented sigh.  Her breathing slows, deepens, as her body relaxes further into sleep.  

Cassian lets out a long, trembling breath as his blood turns to fire in his veins.  

This is everything he’s been dreaming about for months now, if he’s being honest with himself: curled up with Jyn in bed, her body wrapped around his as she sleeps peacefully beside him.  Images of a scene like this haunt his dreams, and intrude mercilessly into every one of their late-night debriefing sessions in his bedroom.  Thoughts of what it might be like to hold Jyn in his arms all night – and how she might feel, underneath him, if he rolled her over, pressed her into the mattress; if he kissed her beautiful mouth – frequently play out behind his closed eyelids as he lies alone in his own bed, chasing sleep.

It would be the easiest thing in the world to lie down beside her right now and hold her until morning.  He would smooth back her hair if she woke in the night feeling poorly.  And in the morning, he would kiss her forehead, her cheeks, the tip of her nose for as long and as many times as she would let him.

It would be the easiest thing in the world to do these things.  But also the most dangerous.  And it would be wrong.  Even though it feels so _good_  to be close to Jyn like this, she’s asleep and drunk besides. Her arms are soft and enticing, and her chest is pressed up against him -- but she has absolutely no idea any of it’s happening.  

Cassian is many things; most of them dishonorable.  But he is not a man who takes advantage of situations like this one.  If he’s to have a night in Jyn’s bed it will be with her full and knowing consent, or not at all.

And so with a strength he didn’t know he possessed ten minutes ago, Cassian carefully, slowly, rolls Jyn away from him.  She still doesn’t wake up, but she registers her dissatisfaction all the same, frowning and muttering as he moves her.  Her lips are parted, and her tongue darts out for a moment as she settles onto her back. Cassian’s eyes are drawn irresistibly to its movement, like a moth to a flame.  

He lets out a soft whimper in the back of his throat and turns away from her before he can second-guess his decision to leave her quarters.    

Feeling like he’s flying on autopilot, Cassian goes into the refresher to get that glass of water he promised her. He puts it on her nightstand with trembling hands.

With one last lingering look at her face, Cassian pulls her blanket up and over her shoulders.

“Good night, Jyn,” he whispers hoarsely, though he knows she can’t hear him.

 

 

* * *

 

 

It doesn’t take Cassian long to find Jyn the next morning.

She’s sitting alone at a table near the back of the mess hall.  Her head is down, resting on her folded arms. There’s a tray loaded with food, and a steaming mug of caf, on the table in front of her, but all of it sits untouched.

Cassian approaches her with trepidation, his own tray clutched in his hands. When she doesn’t look up or acknowledge him in any way, he sits across from her without waiting for an invitation.

He swallows. “Jyn?”

At the sound of his voice Jyn finally lifts her head and looks at him.  Cassian winces. Her eyes are bloodshot and ringed with dark circles, and her splotchy, pallid complexion screams hangover and misery.

As hard as it is to see her like this, Cassian supposes it’s to be expected after the night she had.  

“How do you feel?” he asks tentatively.

She gives him a wry smile.  “Like shit.” She gingerly picks up her mug and brings it to her lips, but then sets it back down again without drinking.  “How much did I have last night?”

Cassian chuckles. “I’m not totally sure. Too much, though.”

She rolls her eyes. “I figured that part out myself.” She pauses, then, and bites her lip. “You left last night,” she mutters.  Her tone is neutral, but her eyes are on him like a dare. In the harsh light of morning, somehow it feels like nothing so much as an accusation.

Cassian is at a total loss over how to respond.  He picks up his own mug to buy himself some time.  But he frowns, and sets the mug back down on the table, when he realizes he’s already drunk its contents.

“You remember last night, then?”  It’s probably not what he _should_ say to her, but it’s too late to take it back now.

She scoffs.  “Of course I remember,” she says. “I’m not an idiot.”

“No, you’re not. But you were drunk, Jyn.   _Very_ drunk. You basically passed out the minute I got you back.”  He looks down at his tray, then closes his eyes.  “You’d also spent a good part of the previous hour telling me you were fine and didn’t need me.  So yes, of course I left.”

Jyn makes a quiet noise of frustration.  “I _was_ fine.  I _didn’t_ need you.” She pauses, and looks away.  “Doesn’t mean I wasn’t grateful you had my back at the cantina.”

Cassian’s eyes go wide.  “What?”

Jyn still isn’t looking at him when she continues.  “It _also_ doesn’t mean I didn’t want you to stay once we got back to my quarters.”

Before coming down to breakfast this morning, Cassian had prepared for this conversation to go any of a number of different ways.  He’d worked out what he’d tell her if she didn’t remember anything from last night.  He’d planned how he’d respond if she _did_ remember what happened, and either yelled at him or punched him.

Nothing in any of his past dealings with Jyn Erso, however, has prepared him for this.

On impulse, he decides to go all in.  “Of course I had your back, Jyn. That’s what we do, isn’t it?”  He hopes she can’t see how badly his hands are shaking underneath the table. 

Jyn doesn’t say anything else for a very long moment.  But her eyes are locked on his as she brings the mug of caf to her lips again, and Cassian can feel her gaze on him as acutely as any physical touch.

When she puts the mug back down on the table, she’s giving him a soft smile.

“Thank you,” she tells him in a quiet voice, the words like a seismic shift beneath Cassian’s feet.  

 

 

* * *

 

 

Weeks later, Cassian can’t remember which of them was the first to take the other’s hand at breakfast that morning and hold in it in their own.

He looks across the cockpit to Jyn, dozing in his co-pilot seat, his parka draped over her small form like a makeshift blanket.  He smiles, and decides it probably doesn’t matter who touched whom first.

He leans over and presses a gentle kiss to her forehead as she sleeps beside him, grateful for the opportunity at last.

**Author's Note:**

> If you'd like to come say hello on tumblr I'm there as jeeno2. :)


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